1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to telecommunications systems, and in particular, to telecommunications systems that provide simultaneous voice and broadband services over ATM connections over the local loop.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The telephone wires to the residence are known as the local loop. The local loop has primarily been used to carry POTS traffic and low speed data using modems. POTS is an acronym for “Plain Old Telephone Service” and generally entails voice traffic. Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) technology has been developed to provide greater bandwidth to the local loop. DSL technology superimposes high bandwidth data over the analog POTS traffic on the local loop. This high bandwidth data is transparent to the POTS operation of the local loop. At the central office, the high bandwidth data is removed from the twisted pair and provided to a separate data network. The POTS traffic remains on the twisted pair and is provided to a class 5 switch. As a result, DSL technology allows high bandwidth data and POTS traffic to co-exist on the local loop. POTS traffic is still handled by a class 5 switch in the conventional manner, but the high bandwidth data is removed from the line before the class 5 switch.
Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) and Synchronous Optical Network (SONET) technologies have also been developed to provide broadband transport and switching capability to Local Area Networks (LANs), Wide Area Networks (WANs), and other networks. Prior systems do not contemplate converting the voice traffic to ATM before it is placed on the DSL local loop. This is because standard class 5 switches on the network side of the local loop do not typically handle ATM voice traffic. As a result, ATM technology has not been combined with DSL technology to carry residential POTS traffic. POTS traffic carried by a DSL local loop still requires processing by a complex and expensive class 5 switch.